Hanging file folders made of stiff material with metal margin supports and sharp creased bottom folds are in common use. The sharp crease fold at the bottom prevents the thin paper held in the folder from curling at the bottom and collapsing down into a roll. When the material to be filed is itself stiff and light such as compact disks, computer disks, and cards, a less expensive method of construction is called for.
The present invention uses a continuous web of a flexible sheet material looped into file pockets that use a shared hangers between every two pockets. The hangers which separate the file pockets may be written on or a separate label strip may be attached. By lifting the hanger, the contents of the file are raised smoothly from the looped bottom of the file pocket allowing for easy viewing and removable. In addition, in the case of CDs and DVDs, the disc""s center hole comes up out of the pocket for safer handling. An aperture or opening through the file pocket""s lower loop serves to locate a disc shape and prevent its rolling out of the pocket. This method of construction reduces the cost and bulk of hanging files making them practical for smaller media such as business cards, CD-ROMs, DVDs, diskettes, cassettes, booklets, stamps, and the like.
In the present invention, hanging files can be made small enough to fit crosswise in an a existing hanging file folder and even smaller ones can be made to hang crosswise in it. Such miniature hanging files may be made from a continuous web of a flexible sheet material preferably a heat-weldable plastic film such as a laminate of nylon-polyethylene. Along the length of the film, at regular spacing, a small amount of the plastic film, say one inch, is folded and welded to create a one half inch wide hem or channel. A one half inch wide hanger wider than the strip and having end notches slips through the channel. The distance between the channel welds defines the file pocket depth. The bottom of the pocket may be left in a loop shape, or creased, as required. A centered hole or aperture in the bottom of each file pocket engages the circumference of a CD to thereby restrain it from rolling from side to side in the pocket.
The metal hangers of existing file folder hangers are often stiffened along their length by forming a crease or recess. This adds to overall file thickness since the stiff cardboard of the file pocket cannot conform to this crease. The present invention takes up less space because the flexible plastic film will conform to any cross-sectional shape given to the hangers. When the media held in the present hanging file is small like CDs, the crease in the hanger is not required making for an even thinner overall file package.
With the present invention, any individual file""s contents can be inspected and removed by lifting the hanger which causes the contained media to slide smoothly upwards from the rounded or looped bottom of the file pocket. Upon releasing the hanger, the weight of the adjacent file""s contents causes the selected file pocket to fall back down into place.